Pros
update
25 Jan 07
The heart of a player…
Sport is a fickle master. Every player experiences this reality, whether it’s Jonny Wilkinson’s fall from World Cup glory to injury woes, or Andy Roddick’s straight set defeat by Federer at the Australian Open (in the week when he was described as ‘playing the best tennis of his life’). Yet, even though we know that sport is fickle, it’s so common that the feelings of Christian players, and those who aren’t Christian, are determined by how their sport is going. When we win or play well we feel good about ourselves; and when we lose, get injured, or play badly we feel dejected. But it’s not just in sport that this happens. For so many people their hearts and emotions are ruled by the circumstances they face.
Paul tells us to ‘let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts’ (Colossians 1:15). He’s saying that by the Holy Spirit we should fight wrong tendencies for our feelings to be governed by circumstances, instead letting them be governed by Christ and his peace. As we’ve seen in Colossians so far this peace has two parts to it. First it’s an external peace with God because ‘the record of debt that stood against us’ (Colossians 2:14), which outlined all the ways that we were guilty in front of God and deserving of death, has been cancelled by Jesus’ blood on the cross. Secondly, it’s an internal peace in our hearts that comes from having Jesus Christ ‘the hope of glory’ (Colossians 1:27) living in us by his Spirit strengthening us and giving us energy. So if we orientate ourselves to these amazing realities and really think about them and get excited about them, then by his Spirit God will give us peace in our hearts. This doesn’t mean that we will no longer care whether we win lose or draw, but it means that sport or circumstances around us don’t determine whether we’re anxious or at peace, happy or sad.
But there’s another reason why this peace is so important. Just as a golf player who’s dissatisfied with his swing will make little tweaks to it and try to change it until he feels happier, so Christians who don’t feel at peace in the Lord are always tempted to tweak their Christian walk and either add something to their faith in Jesus or take something away from it. That’s why as Paul says at the end of this verse it’s vital that we’re ‘thankful’ in Jesus Christ, because thankfulness flows from the heart of a Christian player who knows that in Jesus he or she has all the riches of God and that they don’t need anything else.
So as you’ve received Jesus Christ as Lord keep going with him just as you’ve been taught, and be overflowing with thankfulness, and may the peace of Christ (not the circumstances of the world) rule in your heart this week.
Graham and Pete
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